Page 24 of Text Appeal

He gives me a long look and there’s something in his gaze. I thought I was getting good at reading him. But now I don’t have a clue. However, sitting here alone with him…the moment feels special for some reason. “Did I thank you?” he asks. “For doing this?”

“I can’t remember.”

“Thank you, Riley,” he says simply.

“You’re welcome, Connor.” I take a deep breath and look away. “Your ex arrives tomorrow, huh?”

He nods.

“How are you feeling about that?”

“Mostly like I don’t want to talk about my feelings.”

“Right. But you two were together for so long. Do you miss her…like at all?” The question is out of my mouth before the thought of boundaries can enter my brain. Curiosity is not always a gift. “You don’t have to answer that. Though you did say you’d tell me everything.”

Nothing from him.

“I’m going to be benevolent and let you off the hook on thatone. You’ve already got half the town all up in your business. No need for me to be there too. Let’s pretend I never asked.”

He stares down the street and mumbles, “Okay.”

“Might be best from now on if I do the bulk of the lying. Making up stories is not your strong suit.”

He cracks his neck. “Agreed.”

“So, what’s the next step in establishing our coupledom? Got any ideas?”

“Guess now that we’ve done the family thing we should be seen in public,” he says. “How about dinner somewhere Friday?”

“The night of Ava’s welcome home party?” I think it over. “Just about everyone you know will be there, won’t they?”

He frowns. “Yeah.”

No way is he going to like what I have to say. But I would be an awful fake girlfriend if I didn’t say it. “If we were happy and in a secure relationship, we’d probably go to that, wouldn’t we?”

His gaze narrows on me.

“It would be all water under the bridge and so on. Because I know she’s your ex, but you’ve known each other forever and have a lot of the same friends, right?”

“I don’t know, Riley.” Guess he was only half frowning before. Because now he is all the way unhappy. “That would be…”

“The absolute worst?”

His nod is a terse jerk of the chin.

“I don’t know what went down between you two. But you’re not going to get a better opportunity to show people that you two are never getting back together.”

He says nothing for a while. We just sit on the hood of the car in the silence that is Main Street after dark on a weeknight. I stare at the stars and eat my ice cream while he thinks it through.

“I hate that you’re right,” he says finally. “We have to go to that party.”

I give him a small comradely smile and bump him with my shoulder. “Yeah. We do.”

“Fuck.”

CHAPTER FIVE

Connor: How are you doing this morning?

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